Notch refuses to certify Minecraft for Windows 8

This is a discussion on Notch refuses to certify Minecraft for Windows 8 within the PC forum, part of the Multiplatform Talk; Tweets from Markus "Notch" Persson slam Microsoft and its upcoming operating system as a closed platform.
Minecraft creator Markus "Notch" ...

Notch refuses to certify Minecraft for Windows 8

Tweets from Markus "Notch" Persson slam Microsoft and its upcoming operating system as a closed platform.

Minecraft creator Markus "Notch" Persson has spit venom at Microsoft and its new Windows 8 operating system. The developer explained over Twitter that he received an email from Microsoft asking for help to certify Minecraft for Windows 8, to which he responded with sharp, cutting words about the new platform.

Notch doesn't want Minecraft on Windows 8. "I told them to stop trying to ruin the PC as an open platform," he said.

Windows 8 launches next month and has generated much buzz over its vast redesign, but it appears Notch won't be among the adopters.

"I'd rather have Minecraft not run on [Windows 8] at all than to play along," he added. "Maybe we can convince a few people not to switch to [Windows 8] that way."

Notch is no stranger to bemoaning the actions of large companies, as he declared Electronic Arts to be "destroying" the gaming industry earlier this year. However, his comments about Windows 8 are in stark contrast to the affection he poured on Microsoft upon Minecraft's record-setting launch on Xbox Live Arcade.

"Hey, Microsoft! You might be a big and scary American company that likes secrets and meetings and such, but I love working with you!" he said at the time.

Will be looking to upgrade my PC soon cause my favourite game of all time will be releasing its new game ,X3 Terran Conflict : Rebirth but going to wait till its out so can get a PC after its release so can ensure it runs at its best .

To answer the question not to sure how it would affect me and always been happy with Windows ( except Vista ) so yeah will get it .

Would like to thank Google and snipping tool for my amazing sig + avatar

I HAVE NEVER IN MY LIFE LEARNED ANYTHING FROM ANY MAN WHO AGREED WITH ME

To be conscious that you are ignorant of the facts is a great step to knowledge

Fuck openness, fuck privacy, fuck indie socialists and embrace software developers. The sooner PC users start paying for their games and apps, the healthier the industry will be for all of us.

A rather bold statement there my friend. First of all how can you fuck openness and privacy? Are you looking for some kind of middle ground where Windows 8 spies on everything you do but it is ok because they tell you they are doing so? Secondly you are assuming that the majority or all of PC gamers don't pay for the games they play?

I am not a PC gamer but i would not like to be branded a PC game stealing pirate!

- Apps must support a clean, reversible installation
- Apps must install to the correct folders by default
- Apps must support x64 versions of Windows
- The app must launch in 5 seconds or less
- Your app must obtain opt-in or equivalent consent to share personal information
- Your app must not stop responding, end unexpectedly, or contain programming errors
- Updates must not decrease your app’s functionality in a way that would be unexpected to a reasonable customer
- Your app must not jeopardize or compromise the security or functionality of the Windows system

Windows certification isn't for the App store, it's so your program isn't a piece of shit. HP Avoids these certifications too and look how shitty their programs are.

A rather bold statement there my friend. First of all how can you fuck openness and privacy? Are you looking for some kind of middle ground where Windows 8 spies on everything you do but it is ok because they tell you they are doing so?

Honestly, I have no problem with the restrictions, limitations and reporting Windows 8 is putting in place to offer better protection to software developers. I don't have a problem with it on 360, PS3, Vita, Mac, iPhone or iPad, so it means nothing to have the walled-garden approach extended to Windows.

If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to lose. Facebook, Google, Apple and Sony already know who I am, what I do and how I spend my cash, so it's no big deal if Microsoft puts their fingers in the same pie.

Originally Posted by Timeless-Enigma

Secondly you are assuming that the majority or all of PC gamers don't pay for the games they play?

The stats are damning. 95% estimated piracy rates from the major publishing houses is a pretty clear majority.

Piracy is a major driver behind the free-to-play, micro-transaction business model the gaming industry is building towards. Do we really want a bunch of Zynga's leading the industry? Pay for games, fund future games.

Originally Posted by Timeless-Enigma

I am not a PC gamer but i would not like to be branded a PC game stealing pirate!

Then welcome to the 5%. There are very few of us who can openly and honestly admit to not being a pirate. I can't afford the $25K fine imposed on businesses for using illegal software, so my incentive to stay on the straight and narrow is pretty high.

Stop thinking you know more than those whose business it is to publish games.

list me one other Large publisher that claims a 95% piracy rate.

meanwhile on the worlds biggest distribuiton service for games, they claim it isn't a issue and the Biggest piracy country in the world (russia) is almost their biggest european market because they are intelligent enough to price correctly and give the right service.

40%...60%...95%...we're splitting hairs. The 95% figure by Ubisoft was obviously intended to grab headlines. In any case piracy is a huge problem, and it's not only the big publishers who suffer. Here's some tangible indie developer numbers to back up Ubisoft's estimates -

For argument's sake, let's go with a lowball estimate of 50%. That's one out of every two people who don't pay for their games / apps. Normal companies operate on a 30% or smaller profit margin. Game publishers operate at far less, typically in the region of 5 - 10% and often post losses in the hundreds of millions per year. Is it any wonder why PC game development has migrated to consoles?

Originally Posted by Ps360

and if the piracy is rampant, Thats still a good thing because Pirates pay more for products then non-pirates.

Bitch, please...there's little to no correlation between 99c MP3 purchases and $60 games. Besides, you missed this gem in your "research" -

The study estimates that 12 additional P2P downloads per month increases music purchasing by 0.44 CDs per year.

Pirates steal at least 144 songs / CDs a year (it's not clear how they define "download") yet go on to pay for only 5 songs more than your average consumer. That's a net loss of at least $144 to earn $5
I find your distorted sense of logic to be illogical.

Your references are all piss-weak and have nothing to do with gaming. So let's hear from some gaming industry leaders about what they think about PC piracy....

The Move to Consoles

A noticeable change in PC gaming over the past few years has been the move away from PC exclusives. More and more games are now being developed first and foremost for the popular gaming consoles: the XBox 360, PlayStation 3 and Wii. The fundamental reason for this is a large discrepancy in sales figures - console versions of games routinely outsell the PC versions by many times the number of units. Ok, so what does this phenomenon have to do with piracy? Well as it happens, the majority of PC developers are laying at least part of the blame for their decision to move to focusing on console-based development squarely in the lap of piracy:

Cevat Yerli of Crytek, the makers of Far Cry, Crysis and Crysis Warhead has publicly stated:

We are suffering currently from the huge piracy that is encompassing Crysis. We seem to lead the charts in piracy by a large margin, a chart leading that is not desirable. I believe that’s the core problem of PC Gaming, piracy, to the degree [that PC gamers who] pirate games inherently destroy the platform. Similar games on consoles sell factors of 4-5 more. It was a big lesson for us and I believe we won’t have PC exclusives as we did with Crysis in future.

John Carmack, often called the 'father of PC gaming', and co-founder of id software, makers of the Doom and Quake series, recently stated:

It's hard to second guess exactly what the reasons are. You can say piracy. You can say user migration, but the ground truth is just that the sales numbers on the PC are not what they used to be and are not what they are on the consoles.

Cliffy B, lead creator at Epic Games, makers of the Unreal Tournament and Gears of Wars series, has been quite outspoken on this topic:

Here's the problem right now; the person who is savvy enough to want to have a good PC to upgrade their video card, is a person who is savvy enough to know bit torrent to know all the elements so they can pirate software. Therefore, high-end videogames are suffering very much on the PC. Right now, it makes sense for us to focus on Xbox 360 for a number of reasons. Not least PCs with multiple configurations and piracy.

Chris Taylor of Gas Powered Games, makers of Supreme Commander, also chimes in with his assessment:

...people are going to stop making [games] on the PC because of my earlier point, what's happened on the PC with piracy. The economics are ugly right now on the PC. You're not going to see these gigantic, epic investments of dollars on the PC when it just doesn't work. The economics have to work. You're going to see those investments made on the console side and it's going to become a more console-centric investment. And then you're going to see them ported back over to the PC and that creates a different experience on the PC.

Robert Bowling, Community Manager at Infinity Ward, the makers of games such as Call of Duty 2 and Call of Duty 4, provided a fairly blunt opinion on the issue. He made a blog post entitled 'They Wonder Why People Don’t Make PC Games Any More', the title of his post along with the contents clearly linking the move away from PC game development with piracy:

On another PC related note, we pulled some disturbing numbers this past week about the amount of PC players currently playing Multiplayer (which was fantastic). What wasn’t fantastic was the percentage of those numbers who were playing on stolen copies of the game on stolen / cracked CD keys of pirated copies (and that was only people playing online).... the amount of people who pirate PC games is astounding.

how i downloaded black mesa source when there was a massive load on the internet.

etc.

also the first bittorent client (utorrent) appears on that list at ), so only a minority of steam users have a torrent program.

It even gets beaten by itunes

uTorrent + BitTorrent + Vuze + BitComet. Learn to count.
40+% of Steam users = 21 million Steam pirates. They also happen to be a large percentage of the core PC gamer market.

Allow me to direct your attention to the following quote, posted above -

Originally Posted by Cliffy B

Here's the problem right now; the person who is savvy enough to want to have a good PC to upgrade their video card, is a person who is savvy enough to know bit torrent to know all the elements so they can pirate software.

I'm just waiting for doodles to start slagging off the Business Software Alliance, Crytek, id, Epic Games, Gas Powered Games and Infinity Ward as ignorant because...you know...sharing is caring.
I guess they're a little harder to dismiss as fucking idiots.

I'm just waiting for doodles to start slagging off the Business Software Alliance, Crytek, id, Epic Games, Gas Powered Games and Infinity Ward as ignorant because...you know...sharing is caring.
I guess they're a little harder to dismiss as fucking idiots.

Good thing all those companies also lie about piracy too (EA owns crytek and is ruining them, Epic games has too much money to care, Infinity ward is a shell of it's former self, Gas powered games ruined it's own series in a sequel, id Software hasn't released anything amazing in a long time except for a engine and is trying to eat off its legacy and john carmack, etc.)

the BSA even supported SOPA. i am wondering how the hell you can agree with people like this.

Good thing all those companies also lie about piracy too (EA owns crytek and is ruining them, Epic games has too much money to care, Infinity ward is a shell of it's former self, Gas powered games ruined it's own series in a sequel, id Software hasn't released anything amazing in a long time except for a engine and is trying to eat off its legacy and john carmack, etc.)

the BSA even supported SOPA. i am wondering how the hell you can agree with people like this.

Can you come up with any better arguments than your own pathetic opinions? Try facts and figures instead of childish "they suck cos I say so" responses.

A quote from the very article you posted to defend your strawman position -

Originally Posted by CD Projekt

Let's make this clear: we don't support piracy. It hurts us, the developers. It hurts the industry as a whole. Though we are staunch opponents of DRM because we don't believe it has any effect on reducing piracy, we still do not condone copying games illegally. We're doing our part to keep our relationship with you, our gaming audience, a positive one. We've heard your concerns, listened to your voices, and we're responding to them. But you need to help us and do your part: don't be indifferent to piracy. If you see a friend playing an illegal copy of a game--any game--tell your friend that they're undermining the possible success of the developer who created the very game that they are enjoying. Unless you support the developers who make the games you play, unless you pay for those games, we won't be able to produce new excellent titles for you.

Where's the "we support piracy" argument you're struggling so hard to find?

If it made anyone but a couple of third-rate indie devs more than a few bucks (good indies are suffering 90% PC piracy rates, as evidenced above), you'd think someone would come out in support of it in the gaming industry.

To bring it back on-topic - lower piracy rates thanks to a less open Windows 8 OS is a good thing for the gaming industry. I'm happy to sacrifice privacy, the ability to customise my Windows experience and B-Grade indie games if it means better, cheaper, more creative and higher-risk AAA titles. What about you, dear viewer?

meanwhile on the worlds biggest distribuiton service for games, they claim it isn't a issue and the Biggest piracy country in the world (russia) is almost their biggest european market because they are intelligent enough to price correctly and give the right service.

I have been to both Russia and Ukraine. You cannot buy a legal copy of a game or movie anywhere in those countries. And that is not me exaggerating, In the two weeks I spent there I could not find a store that sold me a legal version of a game. Everything was burnt but sold in stores as new (it was even shrink wrapped).